OTTUMWA, IOWA -- One of the Heartland’s hottest races heading into the November 6 election is the race for Iowa House District 81 between incumbent Democrat Mary Gaskill and Republican newcomer Blake Smith.

We spoke to both of them and asked them two questions that are of concern to Iowans.

What is the biggest problem facing the state of Iowa and specifically what legislation would you support to address that issue?

“Jobs in the economy 100% and I’ve been pretty clear on what needs to be done. I went to the business owners, went to the families and found out first hand what they need instead of Des Moines telling them what they need to do. We need to increase jobs, cut the corporate tax rates, realign corporate property taxes with the Iowa Constitution and we need to help families get more of their money by cutting individual property taxes and we need to end the retirement tax on older retirees because no budget should be formed on the basis of people who earn that money all their lives,” said Blake Smith.

“The biggest issue of course is jobs and job training and getting our people back to work. We have, we're doing a good job, our jobs scores have come down on the percentages of people but I often wonder if it’s just people who have not been up and looking for their jobs anymore and I’ve talked to several people. One day I just went home so disheartened from knocking on doors because there were like six people in a row that lost their jobs and were looking for work and losing their homes and that is so heartbreaking. So I really believe that keeping the Indian Hills Community College and the community colleges where we have job training is the most important thing that we can do to help as far as the state and then to work with economic development which we've been doing that for several years but we need to up that,” said Mary Gaskill.

Do you support the ongoing effort to remove Iowa Supreme Court Justices who voted in favor of gay marriage and why or why not?

“I would support voting out Wiggins not because of the decision or the issue, but how it was handled. Supreme Court by Iowa Constitution is supposed to take errors at law and give them back to the legislators who prescribed the law. That doesn't happen. They just made a decision and that was it. Why have a legislator if judges can make those kinds of decisions? It’s not (about) gay (marriage), it can be any issue but it’s how they handled it is why I would vote no on Wiggins,” said Smith.

“Well I believe that the Supreme Court in the court system has an obligation and their duties in the state of Iowa are to review if someone feels that our laws are inappropriate or don't meet the constitutionality that they have a responsibility to look at those laws and make a ruling on them. I believe that our court system did that and that I am not going to be voting to remove the justices for doing their job,” said Gaskill.